


The Time We Have

by SuperQatarGirl



Series: Watcher of the Living Lands [7]
Category: Pillars of Eternity
Genre: Deadfire, Father-Daughter Relationship, Fluff and Angst, Gen, Headcanon, Lion Companion, Living Lands has many weird unrelated languages, Singing, The Living - Ship
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-01-31
Updated: 2019-01-31
Packaged: 2019-10-19 21:37:02
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,186
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17609447
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/SuperQatarGirl/pseuds/SuperQatarGirl
Summary: Fatherhood comes with many new thoughts and feelings; most warm and fuzzy, but some do leave the heart cold and despondent.





	The Time We Have

A gentle singing form within the captain’s quarters was what caught Serafen’s ear that particular night as he made his way to his chosen berth as quietly as he could. It seemed that everyone else had already gone to sleep – those that didn’t have duties on deck, anyway – so to hear noise from behind the captain’s door was unexpected to say the least. The Watcher had been the first to head below deck, claiming to turn in for the night; seems the lad had been lying.

The more Serafen listened, the more the voice was unmistakably the wood elf’s, singing what the witch thought was… a lullaby? He hadn’t heard many of those in his own life and those that had been sung to him hadn’t been in whatever odd language the captain was using at that moment. It did, however, sound an awful lot like the words the Watcher used inside his own head. Huh, so those weren’t just nonsense.

Still, why would the hunter be singing a lullaby of all things? For a quick moment Serafen thought the captain might have been trying to help Xoti find some form of peace, but a quick peek over his shoulder disproved that idea; the contemplative was hunkered down for the night in her own berth, the one above the farm boy’s. Nobody else had trouble sleeping, so far as Serafen knew; he’d have been able to sense that.

And suddenly, Serafen found himself back in the captain’s head; if the Watcher’s reaction to his presence hadn’t been so clear and instantaneous, the orlan wasn’t sure he would have even really noticed. Slipping into the hunter’s mind had always been oddly… effortless, like something in the other was already accustomed to having his mind probed. But more than that was what Ninleyn allowed his pirate friend to see through his own eyes. There, on the captain’s bed laid little Vela, tucked into the bedding, head lolled slightly to the side, eyes gently closed. And from the perspective provided it seemed that the elf was sitting on the edge of the bed, a single tan hand reached out and gently holding onto the young orlan’s own furred fingers. 

The sound of the Watcher’s voice was oddly distorted from what Serafen had heard before and only now did it occur to the witch that he’d never been in Ninleyn’s head while he was talking. This was what the captain sounded like to himself? Weird. The words in the lullaby rang clear with meaning now, deep, heartfelt intent burning brightly through the melody. Words of eternal, warm love; the impossible things that would have to happen before this love faded away. These were words spoken not from a tyrant, an owner, a master to an underling, a lesser, an indebted. These were the words from a father to his daughter; nothing less.

Then the song was suddenly over and Serafen was ejected from the Watcher’s mind just as the elf made to stand from the bed, the quickest glimpse of the mighty cat that followed him around caught before the connection was severed. Blinking his own eyes back into focus on his environment just as Ninleyn stepped out of his quarters – lion hot on his silent heels – Serafen took a deep breath or two before his eyes finally locked with the captain’s golden orbs, gently flickering in the dim light of _The Living’s_ interior.

The smile on the handsome wood elf’s face was odd, a mixture of tender, amused and secretive all at once. He moved as soundlessly as only a hunter with years of experience could – especially impressive considering how recent his sea legs must have been – and came to stand right before Serafen, a twinkle now in his eye that the orlan simultaneously dreaded and anticipated learning more about.

“I appreciate you telling Vela that she’s her own person, Serafen.” It was a whisper, but one that carried distinct feelings with it; some of it was pride, some of it was a bittersweet melancholy. “And I know that in orlan years she’s just beginning her journey to becoming a young woman.”

“Aye, that she be, cap,” Serafen replied in his own hushed way, though he oddly enough felt preposterously loud next to the hunter.

“But I’m still her father, and to me, five years feels like nothing.” Serafen couldn’t imagine that, at least not to the extent Ninleyn must have been feeling it; wasn’t there something about elves living the longest out of all the kith? “You’re right that she doesn’t owe me anything, she’s free to go if and when she pleases. She has her own life to live, and if I were her I’d hate to live in my father’s shadow.”

There was a pause in the conversation as the Watcher’s sharp, golden eyes finally disconnected from Serafen’s own yellow ones and the witch found himself slipping back into the recesses of the other’s mind. There were no concrete words at the moment – not even in his gibberish – but simply an overwhelming feeling of parental nostalgia and melancholy. The thought of his daughter – _his daughter_ – leaving left Ninleyn feeling both proud, infinitely so, and empty; like there was more time to be spent together, more things that needed saying. _The kind of regret he’d heard other elves speak of._

But just as quickly as the feeling had appeared it was gone again, replaced with the real world coming into sharper focus once more and the face of a tired man, ripped to pieces by a god, with the barest hint of a smile hoping for understanding curving the corner of his lips. Serafen found himself at an odd loss of words and so took to scuffing his boot along the wooden floor gently, brow set in a confused frown.

“I sometimes forget how others in this world view orlans; how oppressed and mistreated many of your kind are by the rest of us kith,” the captain started in an empathetic tone, his own eyes falling down beside him, landing on his lion’s head just as his hand began to stroke the beast’s mane gently. “I just want you to know that I would never indenture anyone – orlan, elf or any other kith – in the ways you’ve seen done.”

“Nay, captain, I be knowing that,” Serafen replied almost nonchalantly, flashing the Watcher a sharp-toothed, charming grin. “Seen it in your ‘ead; you’re just a big old softy at ‘eart.”

Ninleyn’s eyes squinted gently as his previously trepidatious little quirk of the lips widened into a genuine, pleased smile: “No secrets from you, huh? Known a lady like that before.”

A small chuckle escaped the blue orlan at that and the right side of the captain’s lips just rose that bit further and his eyes moved back up to meet Serafen’s. There was a certain light back in them now that the witch only just realised that he’d been missing up until this point.

“So, who’s berth can I steal for the night? Or will I have to sleep on the floor with Kharis as my pillow again?”


End file.
